The passengers all started—the captain brought his hands together with a tremendous clap, and exclaimed:
"Murder will out! But who'd have thought I was to be the man to find out the secret of the Carmi Chums? Guess I'll be the biggest man on the New Orleans levee, after all. Yes, certainly—of course some ladies'll go—and a preacher, too, if there's such a man aboard. Hold up, though—we'll all go. Take your soundings, quick, and we'll drop the steamer just below the point, and tie up. I wonder if there's a preacher aboard?"
No one responded for the moment; then the Judge spoke.
"Before I went into the law I was the regularly settled pastor of a Presbyterian Church," said he. "I'm decidedly rusty now, but a little time will enable me to prepare myself properly. Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen."
The sounding-boat pulled away, and the Judge retired to his stateroom. The ladies, with very pale faces, gathered in a group and whispered earnestly with each other; then ensued visits to each other's staterooms, and the final regathering of the ladies with two or three bundles. The soundings were taken, and, as the steamer dropped down-stream, men were seen cutting a path down the rather steep clay bank. The captain put his hands to his mouth and shouted:
"Dig only one grave—make it wide enough for two."
And all the passengers nodded assent and satisfaction.
Time had been short since the news reached the steamer, but the Bennett's carpenter, who was himself a married man, had made a plain coffin by the time the boat tied up, and another by the time the grave was dug. The first one was put upon a long handbarrow, over which the captain had previously spread a tablecloth, and, followed by the ladies, was deposited by the side of the body of Red. Half an hour later, the men placed Black in the other coffin, removed both to the side of the grave, and signalled the boat.
"Now, ladies and gentlemen," said the captain.
The Judge appeared with a very solemn face, his coat buttoned tight to his throat, and the party started. Colonel May, of Missouri, who read Voltaire and didn't believe in anything, maliciously took the Judge's arm, and remarked: